Behind-the-behind: making art last
Hello friends,
My father had a wonderful expression, “the behind-the-behind” — all the invisible preparation, logistics, and labor that makes something like art possible. As an independent artist, I have to research new materials, prepare the necessary supports, make the work, design and fabricate archival storage, keep a worklist and document every piece photographically. This behind-the-behind has required much of my energy these last few months, but artists rarely detail these processes.
Arches Huile paper
Most paper is attacked and weakened by the linseed oil in oil paint. The Arches paper mill (active in Vosges, France since 1492!) now makes a “Huile” (oil) paper formulated to prevent this. For the last decade, when I’ve suddenly had an idea, I’ve torn off a piece from a long roll and started painting. I work in the studio nearly every day, and that means a lot of pieces on paper accumulating: 425 from the last ten years, according to my worklist. Long ago, I was astonished to learn that poor storage causes the most damage to art, but I now face the storage dilemma myself.
Works on paper — especially large works, and most of mine are 132 x 92 cm (52 x 36 inches) — are hard to protect long-term, as the works often want to stick to one another, and surrounding materials must be neutral pH (acid-free). After the application of a conservation-grade fixative, each piece needs to be protected and separated from its neighbors. I use archival-grade Tyvek (spun polyester) to make both enclosing folders and interleaving sheets, but these must be stored flat, with their corners protected, and out of the way of dust and dirt. My solution has been to buy huge flat files, and having recently outgrown the first unit, I just installed a second, so that the preeminent object in our “living room” is now a tower of ten drawers. Not every spouse would be happy about this, but I’m very lucky to have Nancy!
Dibond: aluminum composite panels
Linen canvas has a beautiful texture, but it’s highly reactive to changes in humidity and temperature, and as it expands and contracts, it tears the oil paint layer apart, which is why virtually every older painting is badly cracked. One exception is work by Gillis van Coninxloo, a Flemish landscape painter of the 16th c. who worked on copper panels. Dibond is a remarkable modern equivalent, and has proven to be a superb support for oil paintings. Dibond is technically an “aluminum composite panel,” just 3 mm (1/8 inch) thick, with a solid polyethylene core (both light and stable), and a thin facing of painted aluminum on both sides.
My current process combines the rich surface of linen with the durability of Dibond. When I’m working in Pennsylvania, I adhere raw linen to a Dibond panel, then prime and sand it twice before starting to draw. When I work in Minnesota, where it’s not feasible to work on panels, I paint on a pre-primed linen from Belgium, roll the paintings for shipment to my home studio, and then bond the painting to the panel in a vacuum press. In either case, the bond between the linen and the aluminum secures the canvas in place, keeping the paint film unstressed.
Dibond is expensive, and preparing panels for painting is complex, time-consuming and has required a long learning curve. But the paintings are imperturbable: you can rap on one with your knuckles, or open a window and let in a flood of hot, humid air, and they shrug it off. While most paintings must be rigidly climate-controlled forever, Dibond’s stability precludes this ongoing carbon/energy debt.
When a painting is going to be exhibited or sold, I attach an aluminum bracing structure to the back, and bolt on a protective powder-coated aluminum frame. No old-growth trees need be cut down, as aluminum is the third most abundant element in Earth’s crust.
I just framed and shipped a crate of work to London, and this past weekend I had a wonderful studio visit from Dotahn Pissarro-Stern. Next week, I leave for a month of pure painting in Minnesota: a welcome change!
As always, I would be delighted to hear from you, and please forward this email to anyone who might be interested. My latest works can be seen at cbcampbell.com.
Thanks, Christopher Campbell